Update on what I've been up to

I figured I'd just kind of post an update on how things have been going out here.  It seems I post about all the big adventures, but not so much the day to day stuff.

First ... I may be done with my breeding efforts for the year.  This year we were supposed to have foals hit the ground from both Pam and Nellie.  Unfortunately, they didn't take.  This was a bit disappointing, but it made me put more effort into things this year.

We found a Vet named Dr. Smith who we love out of Quitman TX.  We took Nellie and Pam down to him to be ultrasounded so we could find out exactly when our best chances of putting the mares with the stallion would be.  Last year we just left the girls in the pasture with the stallion for 45 days and thought for sure it would have happened.  For whever reason, it didn't take.  We think much of it might have been that the mares were fighting over the stallions attention.  We decided that this year, we would try a different technique.  With the help of Vet ultrasounds, we took each mare, down individually for some one on one time with the stallion.

This past weekend I just got Nellie back.  So ... hopefully I've got 2 bred mares.  In a few weeks I will take them both back to Dr. Smith and have him ultrasound them to verify if they took or not.  I tell ya ... I will be very happy to actually have some science behind the breeding this year.  No more guessing, I'll know exactly what's going on.  If, for some reason they didn't take, we can try again this year.  I'll try to keep y'all updated on what happens here.

All the horses are healthy and happy.  With my in-laws purchasing 12 acres of land next to me, I have much more grazing land now and all the horses are fat and happy on all the good grass that has been growing.

This makes me happy!

One thing I have done recently is due to my awesome wife.  We had the opportunity to get a round pen.  My wife insisted that we needed it, so I reluctantly got out the checkbook.  What a good decision that was.  I separated Whinny from the herd, and have her kept in the round pen now.

My problems with Whinny have been that she is just not a people horse.  She isn't scared, but she will just stand 6 inches out of reach, and won't let you get closer.  This is Soooo annoying, especially when the farrier is there and ready to trim her.  Now I have her in the round pen, so I feed her everyday.  We're slowly getting better.

What I started doing was to walk into the pen, and call her to me.  She of course, ran away, so I purposely drove her away from me.  Nearly like lunging.  I made her run, and run, and run, and RUN.  Then I'd stop, and call her in.  If she didn't come to me, I ran her some more.  I repeated this, till she let me touch her.  Once she did that, I just pet her all over, and talked sweet to her for 5-10 minutes.  After that, I feed her.  It's getting better.  She still won't come to me right away, but this morning after running 2 laps around the ring, I stopped her and she came right to me.  I think she's getting the idea that if she lets me pet her, she doesn't have to run.  This is a good thing.

I hope to get her nice and ground broke so that we can get her saddle trained for my son.  Next year she should be ready, and with her sweet disposition, I am hopeful that this will be a great match.

That's about it on the horse front.  Other than that, we're just busy working and living.  I do take plenty of time to stop and smell the roses.  What good is it being busy improving your life if you can't take the time to enjoy it?

Also,  in case you didn't know, my friend Bob Skelding (the  wagonteamster) is on the move again in his 4th trip across the country.  This time he's doing a loop from colorado, up through all the western United States.  Check out his blog and read about his adventures at www.wagonteamster.com.